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When we consider the numerous circumstances by which its progress may be assisted or retarded, and the various species of experience which serve to compose the substance of knowledge, nothing will appear more liable to incidental difference than mental characteristic. Education is, undoubtedly, the chief of intellectual casualties, and those incidents which affect the fortunes of literary men. Such is the importance of its influence on the mind, that a very ordinary capacity, by receiving all the culture of which it is capable, may be exalted to a very high degree of respectability; while the greatest genius, by being engaged in the lower occupations of life, may be so degraded, as to remain undistinguished from the croud of mankind. The want of education, must have precluded those who possessed the greatest talents from the temple of Fame. Without its influence, we may suppose Shakespeare, Newton, and Milton, and many other celebrated names, would have been unknown.

"Full many a gem of purest ray serene

The dark unfathom'd caves of ocean bear;
Full many a flow'r is born to blush unseen,

And waste its sweetness on the desert air."

A distinction is, certainly, to be made between acquirement and talent; and between ignorance and imbecility. That sort of artificial experience, commonly called education, furnishes a knowledge of things, which could never be attained from nature, by any individual, however great his ability. That classification of objects, which goes by the name of the sciences, is the work of thousands. By it, a person, in a short period; becomes master of the combined reflections and remarks of mankind for ages. General improvement is slow, and the pro gress of human reason gradual; but all the wisdom of the species is soon acquired by an individual. So easy is it to learn, so difficult to discover or invent, that a person who has received a scientific education, and a person self-educated, will seem entirely different beings. For, instead of the imperfect notions, tedious narratives, and embarrassed expres

sions, which attend a state of ignorance, we find education, even supposing no extraordinary degree of talent, generally accompanied with a propriety of ideas and language. In the present day, indeed, knowledge and elegance are so generally diffused, that they are, in a great measure, forced upon us ; and he must be unfortunately situated who entirely escapes their visitation.

The ideas of a mind left to itself, must, without doubt, always be very contracted, and can, therefore, never be of great value. But, in accurately comparing the abilities of individuals, it is necessary to be informed whether their knowledge has been collected immediately from nature, or received through the medium of the sciences. In the same manner, to form a just discrimination between the capacity of persons who have lived in periods remote from each other, we should previously ascertain the state of learning in the one period, and in the other. For, without this precaution, the great and mean may change circumstances, and the latter take place of the forThere are often faults chargeable to an age, which it would be unjust to impute to an individual. What is a general and excusable folly at one time, would be a mark of insanity at another. We must not look for equal exemption from superstition in Hambden or Vane, as in Fox or Burke; nor can we reasonably expect the same refinement and delicacy from Rabelais and Chaucer, as from Fielding or Pope. On the contrary, we ought, from the natural progression of improvement, to be cautious not to take imitation for genius, or to imagine that every person whom Dryden has taught to excel him is his equal in talent.

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In the difficult task, however, of marking the original differences of ability, some general rule may, perhaps, be discovered. We may conclude, always, that those persons are of a superior order of genius, who, besides the acquisitions of education, possess a fund of ideas of their own. Those, again, may be held of inferior rank, who, as a mirror reflects merely those objects which are presented to it, and as many opaque bodies shine with a borrowed lustre, are capable of shewing education alone. While some rest their claims to

fame upon their reasoning and reflection, others value themselves entirely upon their learning, and are content with the reputation of being able to comprehend what rules inculcate. A mind of a superior class will always indicate its rank by looking beyond its education; while a weak mind will betray itself by appearing to be absorbed and confined within the compass of that science which it has been accidentally led to study, by its deficiency of general ideas, and ignorance of the analogy of nature. The mathematician who derived no other pleasure from the perusal of the Eneid than tracing the progress of Æneas on the map, and be who, after reading the tragedy of Iphigenia, asked what principle in morals or physics it illustrated, were as deficient in genius as in taste.

There is no person of any original strength of capacity, who will not, under every disadvantage of circumstances, possess a scope of thought and set of principles, peculiar to himself, and relative to his ability; and such, again, is the nature of the human mind, that every person who can distinguish between one and two, may, by minute division and simple arrangement, be taught the most difficult of sciences.

Acquisition cannot, therefore, infallibly mark genius; nor ignorance the want of it. The chief criterion of ability is not learning, but discovery or invention. There is a certain cast of originality which never fails to accompany great talents, as well before education as after it, and which distinguishes them both in ignorance and in knowledge.

We must not, however, expect prodigies at every step. Men are, indeed, oftener to be discriminated by the incidents of external things than by any qualities which belong to themselves; for what is extraordinary must always be rare. Few, therefore, rise far above, or fall far below, their contempcraries; and the talents of society are, for the most part, smoothed down to nearly a level surface. Yet, as great genius will occasionally appear, it may be remarked, with regard to its different circumstances, that a person of superior powers, who has been fortunate in opportunity, is always master of his learning; he never takes more of a science than is consistent with general views, but renders each science subservient to

another, or puts all upon an equality; he knows where to begin and where to stop, and, in short, displays that strength of mind which grasps the whole, and is beyond the reach of bias. Of the commanding superiority of genius, Junius's letters are a striking instance. The author speaks only to what he knows, refuses to discuss what he does not understand; never defends what is indefensible; nor is betrayed to lose sight of his outline by attention to particulars.

Again, a person of equal talents, in the most degraded state of human society, never fails to discover the unaided progress of his mind by the extent of his principles of judging. It is the nature of superior powers to surpass their opportunities, to produce much reasoning on a small degree of information, and to draw general conclusions from a confined experience. As we have Newton in a cultivated age, so have we a Copernicus and a Galileo in a rude. Originality of conception is conspicuous in the two latter, as well as in the former; although what is discovery at one period may be heresy at another, and although talent may sometimes emerge with a splendour too great for intellects accustomed to the darkness of ignorance.

Some men are superior to circumstances, and possess a genius universal in scope as those causes which genius delights to explore. To a powerful mind, little is sufficient to unfold the scheme of things. Whatever be its situation, it, in some measure, rises above the prejudices of the age, indicates its superiority by escaping the contagion of example, drawing its ideas immediately from nature, and attending

* Sir Isaac Newton was one of those whose penetration anticipates direct proof. He made many predictions by the natural strength of his mind, which have since been verified; while there are many persons who have drawn erroneous conclusions from the most distinct experiments. It is, indeed, obvious that experiment, notwithstanding all that has been said in its favour, can never supply the place of intellect; that it is only an instrument subordinate to sagacity, and useful as it is put into able hands. Hence, it often happens that the conclusions of speculative men are more correct than those of practical.

only to those qualities which are of general interest; while common men imitate the follies, and copy the errors of each other, confine their attention and reflection to a narrow circle, and are governed by accidental habits, and local peculiarities.

CHAPTER IV.

Memory the concomitant of education, or experiencc; dependant on judgment, or strength of mind.

AFTER acquisition, memory naturally comes under consideration; for without the power of retaining acquirements, it would be useless to make them.

Memory is, figuratively, that repository in which all our ideas are laid up; or, more strictly, that power by which we retain and recal former images and conclusions.

Memory, however, cannot correctly be placed either before or after mental attainment. It is to be viewed as naturally flowing from experience, and accompanying the expansion of the mind. As to the cause or origin of memory, it is to be found in interest. Whatever we remember is fixed in our minds by some interest, less or more; and the stronger the impression, the more vivid is our recollection. Difficulty of attainment and retention never fail to accompany each other; and labour is always recompensed with remembrance. For, although there is much greater trouble in engraving on marble than in writing upon sand, the former is much more durable than the latter. So likewise that knowledge is always most permanent which has been accompanied with most pain in the acquirement.

It is also to be remarked that the connection between ideas subsists, by relations similar to those which exist externally; by contiguity of time and place; by resemblance and contrast, cause and effect. Thus, things connected by time or place, when viewed separately, recal each other; sometimes, again, a cause carries us through all its effects, and, at other times, effects lead us up to their original cause. Things similar in form or colour also suggest each other, as

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